Steel Markets
Dodge Momentum Index Up 0.6% in April
Written by Sandy Williams
May 7, 2016
The Dodge Momentum Index rose 0.6 percent in April to 116.5 from a revised March reading of 115.8. Planning for commercial construction increased 0.8 percent and institutional planning rose 0.4 percent.
Institutional planning, although volatile on a month-to-month basis, continues to recover and is now seven percent above year ago levels. The pace for commercial construction planning has been subdued and as a result the overall index is essentially unchanged from April 2015.
Six projects, valued at more than $100 million, entered the planning stage in April.
The Dodge Momentum Index, published by Dodge Analytics, is a measure of the initial report for nonresidential building projects and has been show to lead construction spending for nonresidential buildings by a full year. The index is created by summing the dollar value of Dodge’s first-reported nonresidential building projects in planning during a given month. The data is seasonally adjusted and a three-month moving average is applied to reduce the volatility and random variation in the monthly data. The resulting smoothed data provides a better fit between the index and construction spending statistics.
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Sandy Williams
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